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The probation system directly affects 4 MILLION U.S. citizens each year.
Additional vicarious impact is felt by loved ones, who can be left feeling equally
as hopeless and helpless in the face of conditions that limit the thriving of life.


The most drastic risk for people on probation is the risk of completed suicide.
For all people on probation, this risk is greater than 8x the general population.
For reference, the risk for military veterans is about double the general population.


For women on probation, their risk of suicide is nearly TWENTY FIVE TIMES GREATER compared to the suicide rates of women not on probation.


That is a 2500% increased risk.


And the vast majority of women who have been released following
prison time have a prior history of trauma which contributed to their offense.
This is a social stacking of vulnerability, on top of vulnerability, on top of vulnerability.

For perspective, the number of women on probation who
take their lives EACH YEAR equals over one third of the
deaths in the September 11th terrorist attacks.

Statistically speaking, as we turn the quarter century mark from that
horrific historical event of life lost on US soil, there will have been
10x the number of lives of females on probation lost since
that day the made the world stand still and moved people to change.

The enormity of these numbers highlights the extreme suffering of this
sub-population of our nation, and our collective responsibility to change it.


Almost unrecognized by mainstream society, the frighteningly alarming dysfunction of the probation system paralyzes the most vulnerable portion of the population from being able to live effective lives, heightening cost to the public and increasing the worst possible kinds of risk to the individuals, families, and communities of those most affected.


Hopelessness, helplessness, powerlessness, grief, exposure to trauma, and having other people engage in harmful control over one's bodily or psychological safety or wellbeing are some of the most potent risk factors predisposing a person to giving up.


These are all factors amplified by the current workings of the
broken probation system.

It must also be noted that these risks of burdensome harm
to people on probation, resulting from constrictions on their ability to
successfully navigate rebuilding their lives,
are increased under a probation system which was
NEVER INTENDED nor designed for long-term supervised
release for people having served short-term prison sentences.


Probation, or supervised release, was initially intended to serve as a
transitional process for people who had completed long-term prison sentences
and thus were in need of a transitionary period of re-entry.

Few Americans truly contemplate how powerless, and at times hopeless, it could be to have all major aspects of their lives taken out of their control. And, worse, placed in the hands of a person in a position of power who may prove to be uneducated, unaware, ignorant, incompetent, reckless, vindictive, punitive, callous, or abusive.


Even probation officers who consider themselves compassionate or reasonable sometimes engage in thoughts, decisions, and procedures which may knowingly or unknowingly undermine basic safety, bodily and psychological wellbeing. Even if well-intended, sometimes they are too busy to know what is really impacting a person on their caseload. And, sometimes it might be difficult or untrustworthy for a person to disclose information to the probation officer, therefore they end up suffering in silence between a rock and a hard place perhaps even giving up their life due to the impossibility of a situation.

This highlights a need for greater awareness
to promote systemic change.

The general lack of empathy and complacency regarding how it is for a person to function under the pressures of these systems is contributing to the harmfulness, even to the degree of the life-or-death danger being perpetuated by the very system the public entrusts to safeguard lives.


The Backbone of Justice Project believes that increasing empathy in the public, as well as in probation officials, is an important route to helping people better understand the predicaments people on probation face, due to the limiting conditions imposed on them by probation procedures which are unsuitable for rebuilding life after incarceration.


The hope is that sufficient empathy can contribute to meaningful systemic change.
Such change is needed in order to save lives.

Please consider supporting these efforts to help us make certain that the
current punitive orientation of the probation system becomes a thing of the past,
paving an emerging future for rehabilitative, regenerative, restorative modes of justice.

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